


Songstress

by sambharsobs



Series: Edelthea Week 2020 [2]
Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Angst, F/F, Hurt/Comfort, Romance, thea goes through it and edie doesnt know how to help
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-04
Updated: 2020-02-04
Packaged: 2021-02-27 22:48:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,906
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22563505
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sambharsobs/pseuds/sambharsobs
Summary: “Has my war taken away your smile forever, Dorothea?”She was a fool, coming to a woman after a battle, asking her if the war suited her, and asking her for happiness. They both knew Edelgard could not stop her conquest now, no matter Dorothea’s response, and the brunette let her gaze fall.“I-I don’t know, Edie.”--Edelthea Week Day 4: Singing and Fighting
Relationships: Dorothea Arnault/Edelgard von Hresvelg
Series: Edelthea Week 2020 [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1619980
Comments: 3
Kudos: 57





	Songstress

_Cantabile  
The first of a two-part aria, showing off the human voice_

Bandits swarmed the Red Canyon, crawling up the stairs and towards the formation. The sound of leather slapping against ruined marble and dry earth filled the air as two swordsmen approached, weapons raised.

Edelgard, at the front of the line, readied her axe and braced herself for the inevitable impact. There was a clash of metal against metal, surprisingly strong, thought Edelgard. This really must be a last stand for the bandits.

A swipe struck her shoulder, protected by her decorative armour, and she spun to gather enough momentum to strike back. The bandit stumbled backwards, and a despairing magic emerged from the ground.

“Allow me to clean this up for you, Lady Edelgard,” came Hubert’s voice from behind, as the man screamed and fell to the floor. His fingers twitched once, twice, before his body went limp.

The other bandit was dearly close, making a bee-line towards Edelgard. To her left, Professor Byleth made to charge forward, when a roar emerged from her right.

“Yeeeaaah! It’s Caspar time!”

The blue-haired boy flung himself towards the bandit and swung his fists blindly. The swordsman dodged his blows, and brought down his sword heavily against Caspar’s arm. Caspar screamed and fell backwards, only for Professor Byleth to charge forward and strike. Edelgard gripped her axe helplessly.

But then, the smell of roses filled the air, before being replaced by the smell of copper burning. Dorothea let loose a crackle of lightning from her fingertips, and the bandit collapsed onto the ground.

“Caspar!” It was Linhardt, who came rushing from the back lines. “What have you done, you fool?” He crouched beside the boy, placing his hands against Caspar’s bleeding forearm.

“Hey, it’s no problem, Linhardt! See, I’m-” Caspar made to stand, wincing as he did so.

“Caspar! Stop moving, you’re going to make it worse!”

“Ouch! No seriously, I’m-”

Suddenly, the sound of an aria filled the empty canyon.

Edelgard knew the aria well enough, what with it being one of the most popular pieces in Enbarr. The tale of a young lover, pining after a man she loved beyond reason and thought, silenced the squabbling, and made the air lighter, and somehow, brighter.

Her voice, so rich and so sharp, swam across her body like a warm blanket. The ache in her shoulder from parrying the bandit’s blow eased, and Caspar was caught up in staring open-mouthed at Dorothea long enough for Linhardt to heal him.

Turning to the brunette, Edelgard felt her throat go dry.

Her head tilted backwards slightly, her lips trembling as she held each fluttering note, her arms held out before her as if to beckon the lover within – Edelgard let the tension from the encounter leave her body slowly as she drank in the diva’s form.

She had seen Manuela perform once, and had left the opera stunned and smitten. But now, looking at Dorothea’s half-lidded eyes and listening to her ambrosia-dipped voice, she found herself cursing Arundel with a renewed passion.

Pitching, hiking, and then finally exploding into a high note that seized Edelgard’s chest, Dorothea brought the song to an end. Caspar burst into claps, as did Ferdinand and Petra. Dorothea bowed theatrically, and Edelgard felt the echoes of the song ringing in her ears and through her heart.

But then, Professor Byleth glowered threateningly at Caspar, and soon, they were all on the receiving end of a lecture of what would happen if they failed to listen to the Professor.

At the end of it, when Caspar had gotten up and dusted the mud off his pants, and Professor Byleth was contemplating on how to divide their army, Dorothea turned to Edelgard and threw her a wink.

“Liked what you saw, Edie?”

Clearing her throat to only buy some time, Edelgard attempted a sincere reply.

“Of course. Your voice has no match, Dorothea. I now regret not being able to see you grace the stage, if this is what you can do on just the ground.”

“Oh my,” said the songstress, a teasing smile across her cheeks. “If this is how you’re going to praise me, then I wouldn’t mind putting on a show just for you.”

Edelgard smiled at the suggestion, and said, “It would be my honour.”

A wonderful pink stain spread across Dorothea’s cheeks, and an embarrassed giggle slipped past her throat. Dorothea’s genuine smiles were something of a rarity, Edelgard had come to realise, and worth every moment of waiting.

-

_Cabaletta  
The second of a two-part aria, conveying the intensifying of an emotion_

Smoke and fire filled the air, harshened only by the sounds of metal meeting metal, over and over again. They had let their guard down, following their success at Derdriu, and this had been the Church’s response.

Faced by a cavalier, Edelgard can only grit her teeth and hold up her shield as he slams his lance into her shield. Such power can only come out of desperation, she reasoned, and let the thought steel her.

Aymr clacked hungrily at her side, and she let the relic loose at the church soldier, who could do nothing but give up his life when faced with a Hero’s Relic. A heavy rush flooded her bones, and she moved to strike at the mercenary behind him.

“Bow before Her Majesty!” Hubert, from his position behind the barricade, released a confusing, mathematically perfect set of cursed squares at the fighter, who collapsed screaming for his mother.

A moment of silence, a moment to assess the battlefield, a moment to recognise that they were not yet defeated, before two assassins sprung out to strike her.

“Your Majesty, stay back!”

The heavy beat of a wyvern’s wings rushed past her form and an axe was thrust into the stomach of the first assassin. Edelgard had little opportunity to rush to Ladislava’s assistance, as Hubert gripped her arm tightly and dragged her behind the barricade. Helplessly, she opened her mouth to scream and order-

A bow cut through the air and buried itself in the juncture of Ladislava’s neck and curve of her shoulder. The wyvern rider lost her grip on the beast and fell onto the crisped earth, as still as a lake.

“Ladislava!” The scream was desperate, high-pitched, _Dorothea_. A ray of lightning burst from the songstress’ hands, roasting the arrow sent at her and obliterating the assassin immediately. “I’m coming, hold on!”

“Release me, Hubert!” grunted Edelgard, and sprinted towards Ladislava, over whom Dorothea crouched, desperately funnelling faith magic to the general.

“Your Majesty, be careful, more enemies lurk in the shadows!”

“Edie, she’s…Edie, she…”

The sulphur in the air had clogged her throat and her eyes.

Now was not the time to grieve. Casualties were a consequence of her war, she reminded herself. Even if those casualties were the faithful woman who stood by her side unflinchingly for five years, then so be it.

Edelgard rose, her legs weak, and surveyed her surroundings. The battle was nearing an end, she could see, with the enemy ranks quickly thinning out. Yet Byleth, having charged forward with Petra and Ferdinand, had not yet given the signal for victory, and that meant they must stay vigilant.

Looking down, she saw Dorothea cradling Ladislava’s head to her chest, shaking.

She had spent the last five years steeling her will, smoothening out any ruffled fabric in the stoic tapestry she flung over her emotions. The return of the Professor had broken those walls, but the sight of Dorothea, dress as red as the blood around her, sobbing over a corpse, made her question, once again, if this had been the right way.

The signal came then, as the sound of a war-horn from the distance. The battle had been won, she thought, but the tightness in her shoulders did not ease. There had been a time, once, when the sound of music had loosened the ever-present knot in her back, but those times had been tossed aside many years ago.

Cape fluttering behind her, Edelgard turned back to the monastery. She stilled Hubert with one gesture, pointing to Dorothea, and marched back to the castle alone. There were post-battle preparations to be done, stock of the damage to be taken, options to be mapped.

Professor Byleth slipped into Rhea’s office quietly, Hubert in tow, while she agonised over the strategy map. In silence, the three looked at the pieces scattered across the board, now only in red and blue, with a single white piece.

After two hours of no progress, Professor Byleth suggested they retire for the night.

The doors in the reception hall were open, and the bridge to the chapel was in full view. A touch of crimson stood at one end, looking up at the moonlit sky where wyverns once patrolled at night.

Dismissing Hubert, Edelgard made her way to Dorothea.

“Oh, Edie. Still not done for the night?”

Her bright voice, over the last five years, had dulled to conceal a sorrow Edelgard knew she had birthed.

“We were just retiring for the night.”

“Well then, don’t let me keep you, Edie,” she said, turning away. The moonlight bathed her lips and her neck in a soft, silver glow.

“I wished to speak with you,” said Edelgard, wincing at her clipped voice.

“Oh? What’s the matter?”

“I-”

_-am sorry I have made it such that you cannot bear to see yourself in the looking-glass as the beautiful rose I know you to be, without seeing the crimson as blood._

“I find that the war has taken away many things from us,” Edelgard tried instead. Green eyes, which once twinkled teasingly, rested tiredly on her. “Most of them, I can bear to lose. And yet…”

Leaves rustled as a cool gust of air whipped through the bridge.

“Has my war taken away your smile forever, Dorothea?”

Brown hair jostled as Dorothea whipped around to meet Edelgard’s gaze. She was a fool, coming to a woman after a battle, asking her if the war suited her, and asking her for happiness. They both knew Edelgard could not stop her conquest now, no matter Dorothea’s response, and the brunette let her gaze fall.

“I-I don’t know, Edie.”

The smaller woman’s throat went dry at the admission, whispered over the bridge, snatching Edelgard’s heart as the words plummeted to the earth below.

“I see,” she said hoarsely.

Delicate hands, which once held hers gently as they weaved and swooped through other dancing couples in the banquet hall, clutched at the railing. She had been jubilant that day, Edelgard remembered, resplendent and evocative, commanding the attention of every eye in the room with nothing more than a laugh.

A laugh that was born out of a joke Edelgard had made about nobles and tight pants.

She reached for those hands once again, gently surveying Dorothea’s face for rejection. When she received none, Edelgard held them fast.

“If you are unsure,” she said, her voice shaking oddly, “then please allow me to dedicate all of my power into making your smile a reality again.”

Wide eyes scanned her face for mockery, and a pink blush flared across her cheeks. Edelgard held her breath, not knowing what comes next.

A gentle curve formed on ruby lips and a soft huff of air escaped into the night sky. It had taken five years, but it was still worth the wait.

**Author's Note:**

> anyway yeah so i hyperfixate on the opera once and then i think im the fucking shit. opera stans please cancel me


End file.
